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THE mood toward the U.S. among its allies has shifted. Where before Europe was ready to supply unstinting support--"We are
all Americans now"--today there is hesitation and, behind closed doors, even some scolding.

When it needed the allies, the U.S. called on continental Europe and the United Kingdom to join it in its new war. But now
America is accused of behaving like a cowboy--reverting to "the old Bush `up yours' unilateralism," as The Guardian put it.
America is not doing its part to support great multilateral causes ranging from biological weapons diplomacy to international
justice for terrorists.

But the trouble with multilateralism is that it has become a game--a game for its own sake. Multilateral institutions are, after all,
only as good as the real-time goal they serve. And at this crucial moment, that goal is ending the global threat that gave us Sept.
11.

Seen in this context, U.S. departures from various multilateral agendas cease to look like cowboy antics. Rather they represent
leadership that can make the world safer, including for the nations doing the scolding.

Take a security issue at the top of the mind of many citizens of Western nations: germ warfare. This month, at a conference of
the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention in Geneva, the U.S. renewed its objections to a new draft for the treaty. John
Bolton, the State Department's undersecretary for arms control and international security, pointed out that the treaty had not
prevented signatory nations from developing biological weapons. Instead, the treaty had afforded a cover to nations that
continued to mill anthrax.

So, Bolton said, will the new protocol. That is because it does not contain any effective means for verifying whether signatory
nations are keeping their word. The plan requires advance notice, allowing laboratories there to conceal their work.

Additionally, the U.S. said that Iraq, a 1972 signatory, "developed, produced and stockpiled biological warfare agents and
weapons and continued this activity even after ratifying the [biological weapons convention] in 1991." It took advantage of the
absence of United Nations inspectors since 1998 to continue such work. Iraq denied it, a statement carried all over the world.

The U.S. also pointed a finger at North Korea's Kim Jong Il and was backed by South Korea's defense minister, who has
announced that Pyongyang now controls about 5,000 tons of biological and chemical weapons. Tehran and Libya, the U.S.
said, are also developing biological weapons. Syria "may be capable of producing small quantities of an agent" and there is
disturbing evidence about Sudan.

To deter scientists and their masters from developing such weapons in the future, the U.S. wants the treaty to require
signatories to prosecute those in their countries who work in germ-warfare laboratories. It has also called for a new
international code of conduct for all scientists and monitoring of individual scientists.

By ostentatiously listing signatory offenders, America has cast doubt on whether reliance on the treaty alone can prevent rogue
nations from fortifying their germ arsenals. One might think that European governments would side vociferously with the U.S.
on this issue. After all, last week brought news of another case of inhalation anthrax involving a woman in Connecticut.

A reminder of the futility of the biological weapons convention also came with news of the death of Vladimir Pasechnik, a
former official in the Soviet Union's germ- warfare program. After his defection to the West, Pasechnik said he never knew his
research violated the Soviet Union's legal commitment not to engage in such work.

Yet when the Iraqi regime objected to the U.S. claim, European governments kept silent, or isolated the U.S. by accusing it
behind closed doors of being "counterproductive."

The same habit--favoring multilateralism per se over the recognition of bitter realities--is showing up in other arenas. A Spanish
judge announced that Spain would not hand over suspected terrorists to the U.S. for trial unless it promised not to try them
under military tribunals, or to subject them to the death penalty. If the U.S. did not agree, the implication was, it was not
measuring up to the new global standard on human rights, as embodied in such multilateral documents as the European
convention on human rights. The truth is that this would slow down the U.S. in what everyone says is crucial work: bringing
terrorists to justice.

Cowboy has become code for "dumb Republican;" implicit in the scolding of the U.S. cowboy is the argument that the Clinton
administration played the multilateral game better. This is true, insofar as that administration took greater pains not to upset
others. It did not name names (aside from Iraq) at weapons convention meetings. But this focus on finesse failed to prevent
rogue states from building up their stockpiles.

It may well be that there are motives for the new scolding. The U.S. is weighing seriously toppling Saddam Hussein, germ-war
factories and all, and Britain may not want to go along. The Spanish government may value its opposition to the death penalty
more highly than pursuing terrorists. But neither of these goals has much to do with multilateralism.

For its part, the U.S. does not have the luxury of fussing about diplomacy; it must proceed as best it can, for it was Osama bin
Laden's initial target. When Europe hurts the U.S. it also hurts itself, because it makes its own citizens more vulnerable to future
terror attacks. When we support multilateralism for its own sake, we all
lose.

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